“I don’t know if I did right or wrong but I always did
my best.” Quote by Kit Carson on a
placard in his home in Taos, New Mexico
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| Teepees near Taos |
Few people in history have
received as many mixed reviews as Kit Carson.
The larger-than-life mountain man, trapper, scout, soldier, and Indian fighter
was in his lifetime one of the most famous characters of the American West -- the
subject of books and movies. There are
mountains, parks, a state capital and a national forest named after him. In Colorado, where he is still a hero, bronze
Kit Carson statues grace parks from Denver to Trinidad.
But in New Mexico, not so
much. An exhibit on Carson in the New
Mexico History Museum in Santa Fe states flatly that Carson was “admired by a
few, despised by many.” Ouch. A 2014 article in the Albuquerque Tribune was headlined:
“Kit Carson: The Most Hated White Guy in American History?” The article seemed to conclude yes – at least
in New Mexico, a state that ironically treasures every association it has with
the outlaw Billy the Kid.
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| The grave of Kit and Josefa Carson in Taos |
Nowhere in New Mexico is
this dichotomy over Kit Carson more intense than in Taos, the pretty mountain
valley town where he spent 25 years of his life. Carson’s third wife, Josefa Jaramillo, was
from Taos. They married here in 1843 and had seven children. She died giving birth to their eighth. A heartbroken Carson died a month later. They are buried side-by-side in a small park
in the heart of Taos, called the Kit Carson Park and Historic Cemetery.
And that’s where the
problems begin. In 2014, there was a
movement in Taos to remove Carson’s name from the park. Interpretive signs by his quiet gravesite
were defaced and at city council meetings he was called a “murderer” and blamed
for the “Long Walk” of the Navajos, an infamous chapter of American history in
which the Navajo tribe was forcibly removed from their homelands in Arizona and
marched 400 miles in winter to a reservation, where thousands of them
died. It was a Navajo version of the
Holocaust. Carson wasn’t on the march,
but along with George Armstrong Custer, in the changing times of the 21st
century, he has become a symbol of the tragedies inflicted on Native Americans
during the “winning” of the West.
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| Statue of a heroic Kit Carson in Trinidad, CO by Frederick Roth (horse) and Augostus Lukeman (figure) |
Which is a fact that would
have struck the humble Kit Carson as simply amazing. A short and shy man, he was illiterate and
couldn’t even sign his own name. Despite
that, he was fluent in both French and Spanish, as well as Apache, Comanche,
Cheyenne, Arapaho, Crow, Blackfoot, Ute and Dine (Navajo). He had two Indian wives, lived and traded
with the Indians for years and was considered one of the best and fairest of
Indian agents. He served as the principal
guide to the John C. Fremont expeditions of the Oregon Trail, which was the 19th
century equivalent of being an astronaut.
Fremont’s widely read journals made Kit Carson a household name across
America. During the War with Mexico, Carson
helped capture California, sneaking through enemy lines in the dark and running
23 miles to get reinforcements. Later,
he commanded Union forces with honor in the Civil War.
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| Kit Carson |
In his lifetime, Kit
Carson covered thousands of miles on foot and horseback across the American
West, but you can get an intimate glimpse of both sides of the man in just a
short walk around the Taos Plaza.
“The cowards never start and the weak die along the way.” Kit Carson
There has been a plaza in
the center of Taos for more than 200 years.
Originally, it was a fortified square where livestock could be kept safe
at night, but today, it’s a quiet park with large shade trees and benches,
surrounded by adobe buildings in the Spanish Colonial and Territorial Revival
style. Since the buildings are all
connected, when one caught fire, they all caught fire, and they’ve been burning
down together for two centuries, leading, of course, to many changes. The current buildings date back to the
golden era of 1930s tourism, when artists and writers such as D.H. Lawrence
lived here. They drip with New Mexico
charm with covered verandas, exposed wood beams, adobe walls and shops
sparkling with turquoise jewelry, silver, and bright Indian blankets.
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| Near the Taos Plaza |
Just a block from the
plaza is where Kit and Josefa lived in a four-room, 1820s adobe house that is
now a National Historic Landmark operated as the Kit Carson Home & Museum.
You enter the museum
through a pleasant courtyard. This is
where the Carsons did most of their living.
The courtyard was where people cooked, washed, and socialized. It’s also where Carson conducted business as
an Indian agent for the Utes, Apaches, and Taos Pueblo tribes. Many tribesmen pitched their teepees in the
courtyard, where their children played with Kit Carson’s.
In the house, are exhibits
telling his life story. Born in 1809, by
the time he was 16, Christopher “Kit” Carson had run away from his home in
Missouri and gone west on the Santa Fe Trail, working as a mountain man,
trapper and hunter, and later as an explorer and guide. By the time he settled down in the mountain community
of Taos, Kit was the town’s most famous citizen. The
house is small, and the doorways even smaller.
Kit was only 5 feet 6 inches tall. When Civil War General William Tecumseh
Sherman met the famous scout for the first time, he wrote, “I cannot express my
surprise at beholding a small, stoop-shouldered man, with reddish hair,
freckled face, soft blue eyes, and nothing to indicate extraordinary courage or
daring.”
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| The kitchen in the Kit Carson Museum |
The kitchen is reconstructed
as it would have been, when food was prepared here for the nine Carsons. Taos was still the frontier and life was very
simple with few possessions. Each of the
rooms had a fireplace, which was the only heat.
Much of the museum is
devoted to Josefa Carson, and you learn that Kit wasn’t the only Carson with
adventures. Josefa’s sister, Ignacia, was married to the second most famous citizen in Taos, former mountain
man and trader Charles Bent, who in 1846 was appointed governor of New Mexico. They lived around the corner, and you can
walk to their home, also a museum, in a few minutes.
The Governor Bent Museum is a crazy, hodgepodge
collection of Old West memorabilia including bearskins, arrows, guns,
eight-legged lambs, farm tools, and Indian baskets. It was opened in 1959, which appears to be
the last time any exhibit was dusted. Tom
Noeding’s parents opened it and today he runs it, so if it’s open, that means
he’s there and can point out the room where the famous fireplace was.
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| The murder would have taken place right about at the sign. |
While Kit was out of town in January 1847, Josefa
Carson was staying with her sister at this house when the Taos Revolt
began. Taos and all of New Mexico had
been ruled first by Native Americans, then Spanish, then Mexican, and then in
1846 by the United States, who captured it in the War with Mexico and appointed
the first Anglo governor, Charles Bent.
It was too much change too fast for the locals. Tensions built and an angry mob of Taos
Pueblo natives and local Hispanic residents revolted and marched on the
Governor’s house. Bent tried to calm
them down, but they grabbed him from the house, shot him full of arrows,
scalped him alive and literally tore his body to pieces, all in front of what
is now the quiet Op. Cit Bookstore.
Meanwhile, Josefa Carson and her sister Ignacia seized a poker and
spoons and managed to dig a hole through the adobe wall at the back of the
fireplace, and escape.
After the gruesome murder, the Carsons helped
care for Ignacia and her children.
Ignacia lived to be 68 and she and her grandchildren are buried in the
Kit Carson Cemetery Park, not far from her sister and Kit.
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| An old wagon near Taos |
If there was a tragedy to
Kit Carson’s life, it is that he was amazingly good at whatever he set out to
do. Unfortunately, this included
fighting a war against the Navajos in 1865.
Twice, he refused the assignment, but as a soldier he was finally ordered
by Brigadier General James Carleton to lead the campaign. Carson reluctantly did, but he deliberately disobeyed
his brutal orders to “capture the women and kill all the men.” Instead he waged a mostly nonviolent,
“scorched earth” war by destroying the Navajo’s food sources, which forced them
to surrender with little loss of life.
Sadly, in the end, the results were equally horrifying. The Navajos were ripped from their land by
other soldiers and forced on the deadly long march to a reservation, which killed
thousands. Naturally, they blamed Carson
for their defeat and never forgave him.
Ironically, Carson had nothing to do with the Long March, and he even
went to Washington to lobby for the Navajos to be returned to their homeland,
which they were in 1868.
Carson quit the army after
the campaign and he and Josefa died shortly afterward. Standing by their gravesite, 150 years later,
it’s hard not to go back to Kit’s quote, hanging in his home. “I don’t know if I did right or wrong, but I
always did my best.”
IF YOU GO:
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| Green chile stew at Eske's Brew Pub & Eatery |
When Kit was near death,
he allegedly said: “I wish I had time
for just one more bowl of chili.” And by
that he meant, Taos chili. Delicious
cuisine is just one reason that millions of visitors flow to this beautiful
artist community and outdoor recreation center every year. In addition to skiing, Taos is known for river
running on the Rio Grande, hiking, fishing, and spectacular mountain scenery. There are dozens of art galleries and a
fantastic assortment of restaurants, many specializing in New Mexico cuisine based
upon the most famous of all green chiles, those grown in NM. The Eskes Brew Pub & Eatery near the main square has an
excellent green chile stew as well as half dozen of their own craft beers. Wednesday night is “Bluegrass Night,” with
many local musicians pickin’ away on guitars, banjos and fiddles.
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| Taos Pueblo -- the oldest continuously inhabited spot in North America |
Another must visit is the
Taos Pueblo, four miles from town. This is
the oldest continuously inhabited spot in North America. The two main structures are believed to be
well over 1,000 years old and consist of individual adobe homes built side by
side and in layers, with common walls and no connecting doorways. They look today much like they would have when
Kit Carson was their Indian agent; the only change to the adobe structures was
the addition of blue entrance doors (the homes were originally entered via
ladders from holes in the ceiling).
Between 50 and 100 people still live in the Taos Pueblo without running
water or electricity. Students give
tours, and several of the buildings are open as shops selling jewelry, pottery
and Indian fry bread.
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| The original San Geronimo church is now a cemetery. |
In 1847, shortly after the
uprising in which Charles Bent was killed and Josefa Carson had her narrow
escape, the U.S. Army attacked Taos Pueblo in reprisal. Many of the Taos Pueblo people went to the
San Geronimo church for protection. The
army wheeled a cannon to the church, and fired into it point blank, killing
dozens of women and children. The ruins
of the church became a cemetery and the leaders of the revolt were hung in Taos
Plaza. Visiting today, it’s hard to
believe this tranquil and beautiful spot had such a bloody past. Because of past oppressions against them, the
language of the Taos People, Tiwa, is unwritten and unrecorded and is passed
down orally from generation to generation.
It is quite remarkable to see people live here as they did centuries ago
and walk literally back into the days of Kit Carson.
Where to Stay:
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| The spectacular entrance to El Monte Sagrado Living Resort & Spa |
Just a short walk down Kit
Carson Road from Kit’s old house is El Monte Sagrado Living Resort & Spa –
one of those rarest of rare finds – a world-class luxurious resort and spa within
easy walking distance of a historic district.
El Monte Sagrado (which means “The Holy Mountain”) is spread over a
beautiful 11-acre oasis filled with ponds, streams, wildflowers, bridges,
waterfalls and aspen trees. The 84-room
resort became a Heritage Hotel & Resort 10 months ago. The largest independent hotel brand in New
Mexico, Heritage takes great pride in their collection of culturally distinct properties,
and it shows. They are pumping big money
into the $70 million, AAA Four Diamond resort, including major improvements to
the rooms, landscaping and cultural amenities, as well as adding to the
resort’s 300 piece art collection.
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| The Anaconda Bar has a gigantic snake curling around it. |
Among the new amenities
are regularly scheduled concerts by Native American flutist Robert
Mirabal. A two time Grammy Award winner,
Mirabal is also working with the hotel and Taos Pueblo to introduce a new garden
at El Monte Sagrado that will use ancient seeds to grow Native American foods
and spices on the hotel’s grounds for use in its kitchens. The hotel’s gorgeous restaurant, De La Tierra,
serves all three meals, inside or on the patio.
For dinner, go local and try the Caprice Cactus salad, the Crab
Quesadilla and the Elk Chop seared and glazed with Chipotle agave nectar. The
hip Anaconda Bar next door has a gigantic snake sculpture wrapped around the
horseshoe-shaped bar and has one of the best happy hours in Taos with $3.50
local drafts and $5 house margaritas.
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| The lovely grounds have streams and waterfalls. |
The resort offers six
types of rooms. At the top end, the
Global Suites are 1,100-sq. ft. casitas (small bungalows) each decorated with
original art and architecture to reflect different regions of the world, from
China, Japan and Spain to Morocco, Mexico and Argentina. Each of the casitas has two bedrooms, two
baths, log beam ceilings and all luxury amenities from wet bars to pueblo-style
gas fireplaces. Four of them have hot
tubs. If it seems strange to have a
global theme in Taos, there’s no worries.
It works beautifully with the patios walking out into the gardens.
The premiere suites carry
the global theme to Bali, Egypt and Tibet, while the 18 Native American suites
each carry the name of a famous historic Native American and come with king
beds, kiva-style fireplaces and balconies or courtyards overlooking the Sacred
Circle, the green space surrounded by willow and cottonwood trees that is the
center of the resort.
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| One of the spa rooms. |
Finally, the Casita Suites
are fun and funky, part of the original historic hotel with true 1930s New
Mexico style and private patios, all upgraded with modern amenities, while the
Taos Mountain Rooms are more tradition resort rooms but with private balconies,
fireplaces, jet soaking tubs and access to all the amenities of the resort.
And then there’s the
spa. The Living Spa, as it’s called, has
won awards from Conde Nast Traveler to Spa Finder, and no wonder. The ten gorgeous and eco-conscious treatment
rooms offer benefits such as a sunlit shower and natural waterfall cooling
system. Kit Carson probably took a
natural shower in a waterfall, but not like this. There are candlelit couple’s suites, Thai
massage sessions, 90-minute facials…and when you’re done, don a robe and walk
through the gardens to the saltwater pool for a long relaxing soak. Kit Carson would have never left Taos if he
had discovered this place.
For information on other
attractions in Taos,
